From the above we must conclude either that the English version rests on a very composite version of which we do not know, or that the composer of the English version was very eclectic, and selected his material from very different sources. The latter explanation seems the more probable one. In this connection it is important to note an observation first made by Zarncke and afterwards corroborated by Kölbing (Engl. Stud. ii, pp. 281-2) that the different prose versions of legends influence each other reciprocally, producing mixed or composite forms of the legend (_mischredactionen_) whose exact descent it is impossible to trace. It is here that the learned element makes itself felt and differentiates the tradition of a legend from the tradition of a romance or of a song. The influence of this learned element we must probably assume in explaining the tradition of our legend of the Assumption, which seems to be a _mischredaction_. [Footnote I-23: A legend cycle composed in Latin prose by the Italian Jacobus a Voragine, Bishop of Genoa.] § 6. OTHER ENGLISH VERSIONS. The story of the Assumption seems to have circulated, as we have seen, both as a romantic story and as a devout legend. It must have been in the first of these two _rôles_ that it was admitted to the famous collection of romances in the Auchinleck MS. Here the story appears in a new dress, composed in six-line strophes, with _rime couée_, probably under the influence of the ballad singers. The content of this version (cf. M. Schwarz, Engl. Stud. viii, pp. 428 ff.) seems to be substantially that of the earlier version of the present volume. The first stanza of this version is,-- Who so bereȝ palm, þe tokne is þis, Þat in clene lif he is; Þat is to vnderstonde: Hit is tokning of loue, Þat god him haueȝ wraththe forȝoue, Þat bereȝ palm on honde. The Assumption also forms a member of the Southern cycle of legends, which go to form a legendary. In this _rôle_ it appears in Harl. MS. 2277, “a parchment book in a long 4to, imperfect at the beginning and elsewhere; which formerly contained the legends of the Saints, etc., according to the course of the year, written in very old English verse.... The handwriting of this MS. seems to be older than that year” (1320). The MS. contains 69 legends, of which number 38 is _Assumpcio S. Marie_, in 246 long riming lines, the first two of which are,-- Seinte marie godes moder : f{ra}m þaposteles nas noȝt Þo þe holi gost a wit sonedai : among hem was ibroȝt. This version seems to rest on the _Legenda Aurea_[I-24] as an original, although the incident of the tardy arrival of Thomas, which is contained in the Latin, is wanting in this version.